Cooking tray set

ABSTRACT

A set of cooking trays for cooking juicy foods such as tuna fish and including a plurality of tray bodies having bottom walls formed with respective raised central support sheets having recessed drain channels extending around the peripheries thereof for receipt of cooking juices drained from the respective sheets. Side walls surround the respective channels and are formed with outlets in their respective lower extremities for passage of cooking juices collected in such channels whereby the trays may be supported in vertically stacked relationship with the food supported on the sheets of the lower trays in a particular stack being disposed directly beneath the sheets of the respective upper trays of such stack to thereby protect such food from the cooking juices which collect in the respective channels and pour outwardly through the respective outlets during cooking of such food.

[451 July 01, 1973 v COOKING TRAY SET [75] Inventors: Frank V. Vidjak;Lothar Mikalansky, both of Long Beach, Calif.

[73] Assignee: Star-Kist Foods, Inc., Terminal Island, Calif.

[22] Filed: Mar. 15, 1971 [21] Appl. No.: 124,106

[52] US. Cl. 99/425, 99/448 [51] Int. Cl..... A231 1/325, A47j 37/10,A47j 27/13 [58] Field of Search 99/425, 422, 432,

99/444, 448; 220/DIG. 6, 97 R, 97 C [56] References Cited UNITED STATESPATENTS 282,542 8/1883 Lockwood 99/448 FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS279,270 3/1952 Switzerland 99/432 Primary Examiner-Wayne A. Morse, Jr.Assistant Examiner-Arthur 0. Henderson Attorney-Fulwider, Patton,Rieber, Lee & Utecht [57] ABSTRACT A set of cooking trays for cookingjuicy foods such as tuna fish and including a plurality of tray bodieshaving bottom walls formed with respective raised central support sheetshaving recessed drain channels extending around the peripheries thereoffor receipt of cooking juices drained from the respective sheets. Sidewalls surround the respective channels and are formed with outlets intheir respective lower extremities for passage of cooking juicescollected in such channels whereby the trays may be supported invertically stacked relationship with the food supported on the sheets ofthe lower trays in a particular stack being disposed directly beneaththe sheets of the respective upper trays of such stack to therebyprotect such food from the cooking juices which collect in therespective channels and pour outwardly through the respective outletsduring cooking of such food.

9 Claims, 8 Drawing Figures COOKING TRAY ss'r BACKGROUND OF THEINVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates tocooking trays which may be used for commercial cooking of tuna fish orthe like.

2. Description of the Prior Art It has been common practice in the tunacanning industry to cook the tuna fish in wire baskets which aredisposed in vertically stacked relationship on racks disposed in a largevolume cooker. Cooking baskets of this type suffer the shortcoming thatthe juices from the tuna fish in the upper baskets drip downwardly onfish of the lower baskets thereby excessively basting the fish of thelower baskets and damaging the meat thereof. Further, the wire mesh ofsuch baskets imprint a pattern of burned or overdone flesh in the fishbeing cooked thereby resulting in wasting of such overcooked or burnedmeat. Further, such wire tuna baskets frequently are very difficult toclean and the charred residue left thereon damages tuna fishsubsequently cooked in such baskets.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The set of cooking trays of present inventionis characterized by tray bodies which have bottom walls formed withraised central sheets surrounded by peripheral drain channels which leadto outlets in the side walls of such trays whereby the cooking juicesgenerated during cooking of food supported on such sheets will becollected in the channels and drained off through the outlets to therebyprotect food disposed in trays located immediately below such sheetsfrom the hot cooking juices.

An object of the present invention is to provide a set of tuna trayswhich are convenient to clean after each cooking.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a set of tunatrays of the type described which can be conveniently nested together instacked relationship for storage.

A further object of the present invention is to provide a set ot tunatrays of the type described which support the cooking food onunperforated sheets to thereby avoid formation of an imprint on thesurface of the food during cooking thereof. 7

These and other objects and the advantages of the present invention willbecome apparent from a consideration of the following detaileddescription when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a cookingtray embodying the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a top planned view of a stack of cooking trays similiar tothat shown in FIG. 1; v

FIG. 3 is an end view of the cooking trays shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is an elevational view of a set of tuna trays similiar to thatshown in FIG. 1, but in reduced scale; FIG. 5 is a side view of the tunatray shown in FIG.

FIG. 6 is a vertical sectional view, in enlarged scale, taken along theline 66 of FIG. 2 and showing a pair of cooking trays nested togetherfor storage;

FIG. 7 is a vertical sectional view, in enlarged scale, taken along theline 7--7 of FIG. 2 and showing a pair of cooking trays of presentinvention nested together for storage; and

FIG. 8 is a vertical sectional view, in enlarged scale, taken along theline 3-8 of FIG. 3.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Referring to FIGS. 1 and 7, thecooking trays included in the set of present invention include,generally a tray body 211 having a bottom wall in the form of a centralraised flat sheet 23 surrounded by peripheral side and end drainchannels 25 and 27 respectively. The side and end drain channels 25 and27 terminate at respective outlets 31 formed in the corners definedbetween respective side and end walls 35 and 37. Consequently, tuna fish41 may be placed on the respective food-support sheets 23 of each trayof the set and the entire set placed on racks 45 in a large volumecommercial cooker with such trays disposed in stacked relationship suchthat the trays of each stack are arranged directly over one another. Thecooking juices will then collect in the drain channels 25 and 27 andwill be poured out the outlets 31 to fall downwardly in the cooker andbypass the tuna supported in the trays aligned directly therebelow.

The tray bodies 21 may conveniently be formed from drawn sheet metalsuch as stainless steel and each includes a slightly raised unperforatedflat foodsupporting sheet 23 forming the bottom wall thereof andsurrounded by the recessed side and end drain channels 25 and 27. Therespective side and end walls 35 and 37 slope upwardly and outwardly andthe end walls 37 are formed centrally with depressed handles 49 (FIG. 6)and terminate in their upper extremities with sightly inturned lips 51.

Referring to FIGS. 3 and 6, the side walls 35 are formed centrally alongtheir height with a plurality of ears 57 and then turn outwardly andform turned-back upper flanges 59 whereby the trays may be nested in oneanother and the ears will limit telescoping together of such trays.

It has been determined that a convenient size tray for tuna fish cookingis a tray approximately 15 inches wide and 33 inches long. While thehead or tail of the larger tuna fish may overhang the ends of the trays,it has been found that the damage normally done to such heads or tailsby falling hot cooking juices is not deleterious to the tuna fleshitself.

In operation, the tray bodies are coated with a vegetable releasingagent, such as soybean oil, and the cleaned tuna fish 41 positioned withtheir central bodies disposed on the food-support sheets 23. Therespective baskets of the set to be used in a particular cooker are thenplaced on the racks 45 of such cooker and arranged in stackedrelationship to form columns of trays. After the cooker has been loaded,hot cooking steam is introduced thereto and cooking of the tuna fish 41commenced. As the tuna fish cook the cooking juices released therefromis drained off the sheet 23 into the drain channels 25 and 27 and isconducted along such channels to the openings 31 formed at the endsthereof. Referring to FIG. 3, it will be observed that the juices sodrained off the upper trays 21 will fall downwardly past the tuna All inthe lower trays thereby avoiding direct contact with such tuna in thelower trays. This feature is particularly advantageous in the cooking oftuna since continuous dripping of hot juices on the same spot of a tunafish dissolves the tuna flesh and gouges out a channel thereby washingaway a portion of the flesh and resulting in loss of additional fleshwhen the skin is removed from the tuna fish and cleaning thereofcompleted.

It will also be appreciated that the supporting of the tuna on theflat-support sheets 23 provides for uniform support thereby preventingthe formation of a pattern of indentations which normally results fromcooking of tuna fish in a basket formed by a wire gridwork which resultsin loss of substantial amounts of tuna flesh during cleaning of the fishafter cooking has been completed.

After all the tuna fish in the particular cooker has been completelycooked the cooking steam is shut off and the cookers allowed to cool.The hot trays will then be removed from the cooker and the tuna fish 41removed from such trays and forwarded to a cleaning table where the skinis removed from the fish and any damaged flesh adjacent the skin scrapedaway.

The tray bodies 21 are then washed, it being realized that thepre-coating thereof by the vegetable releasing agent enables rapid andeffective washing in a convenient manner. The integral sheet-likecharacteristics of the tray bodies 21 enables the trays to be cleanedthoroughly on all surfaces to thereby avoid build-up of charred residueas frequently happened in the use of the prior art wire gridwork basketsthereby resulting in subsequent flaking off of the charred materialduring subsequent cooking processes and resulting in contamination ofthe tuna by such charred material.

The tray bodies 21 may then conveniently be stacked on one another asshown in FIGS. 6 and 7 for convenient storage with the nesting ears 57of the upper trays nested directly on the flanges 59 of the lower trayswith the respective handles 49 of the upper trays located above therespective end lips 51 of the respective lower trays for convenientaccess when such trays are to be retrieved for subsequent use.

From the foregoing it will be apparent that the cooking tray set ofpresent invention provides an economical and convenient means forcommercial cooking of foodstuffs in a large volume cooker which providesfor stacking the trays in vertical relationship over one another whileprotecting the foodstuffs in the lower trays from damage by the hotcooking juices released from the foodstuff in the upper trays.Additionally, the cooking trays of the set of present invention can beeasily cleaned in a very thorough manner to thereby provide for sanitarycooking of the foodstuff.

Various modifications and changes may be made with respect to theforegoing detailed description without departing from the spirit of theinvention.

We claim:

1. A set of cooking trays for cooking juicy foods and comprising:

a plurality of tray bodies including respective bottom walls formed withraised central support sheets, recessed drain channels extending aroundthe peripheries of the respective support sheets for receipt of cookingjuices drained from the respective sheets, and respective side wallssurrounding said channels and tapered upwardly and outwardly to form anopen top, said side walls being formed centrally in their verticallengths with a plurality of outwardly projecting ears and juice outletmeans disposed at a lower elevation than said respective support sheetsfor passage of juices draining from said channels during cooking of saidfood whereby said food may be placed on said respective sheets, saidtrays supported in stacked relationship, one above the other in a cookerwith food in the respective lower trays sheltered beneath the sheets ofthe respective upper trays while said juice outlet means provide fordrainage of cooking juices.

2. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein:

said bodies are rectangularly shaped in plan view and said side wallsare formd in their lower extremities with respective outlets in therespective corners.

3. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein:

said side walls are formed at their opposite ends with handles.

4. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein:

said trays are at least 10 inches by 25 inches in plan view.

5. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein:

said sheet, channels and side wall are integrally formed.

6. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein:

said outlets extend downwardly to the bottom of said respectivechannels.

7. Cooking apparatus for cooking juicy foods and comprising:

a plurality of trays stacked substantially one above the other, saidtrays including respective bottom walls formed with raised continuouscentral support sheets for supporting said foods and for receivingjuices emitted therefrom during cooking, recessed drain channelsextending around the peripheries of the respective support sheets forcollecting juices drained from said respective sheets during cooking ofsaid food, respective vertically projecting side walls extending aroundthe outer peripheries of the respective channels, and respective juiceoutlet means formed by said respective trays at a lower elevation thansaid support sheets and disposed out of vertical alignement with saidrespective support sheets; and

support racks for supporting said trays in vertically stackedrelationship one above the other whereby said food may be supported onsaid respective support sheets and upon heating thereof for cooking,juices from the food of the respective upper trays will be captured onthe respective support sheets and directed into the respective drainchannels, from where they may drain out said outlets with the juicesfrom the upper trays clearing foods supported on the support sheets oflower trays.

8. Cooking apparatus as set forth in claim 7 wherein:

said bodies are rectangularly shaped in plan view and said side wallsare formed in their lower extemeities with respective outlets in therespective corners thereof.

9. Cooking apparatus as set forth in claim 7 wherein:

said side walls are formed with recessed handles disposed at theopposite ends of said bodies.

. f f *5 i

1. A set of cooking trays for cooking juicy foods and comprising: aplurality of tray bodies including respective bottom walls formed withraised central support sheets, recessed drain channels extending aroundthe peripheries of the respective support sheets for receipt of cookingjuices drained from the respective sheets, and respective side wallssurrounding said channels and tapered upwardly and outwardly to form anopen top, said side walls being formed centrally in their verticallengths with a plurality of outwardly projecting ears and juice outletmeans disposed at a lower elevation than said respective support sheetsfor passage of juices draining from said channels during cooking of saidfood whereby said food may be placed on said respective sheets, saidtrays supported in stacked relationship, one above the other in a cookerwith food in the respective lower trays sheltered beneath the sheets ofthe respective upper trays while said juice outlet means provide fordrainage of cooking juices.
 2. A set of cooking trays as set forth inclaim 1 wherein: said bodies are rectangularly shaped in plan view andsaid side walls are formd in their lower extremities with respectivEoutlets in the respective corners.
 3. A set of cooking trays as setforth in claim 1 wherein: said side walls are formed at their oppositeends with handles.
 4. A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1wherein: said trays are at least 10 inches by 25 inches in plan view. 5.A set of cooking trays as set forth in claim 1 wherein: said sheet,channels and side wall are integrally formed.
 6. A set of cooking traysas set forth in claim 1 wherein: said outlets extend downwardly to thebottom of said respective channels.
 7. Cooking apparatus for cookingjuicy foods and comprising: a plurality of trays stacked substantiallyone above the other, said trays including respective bottom walls formedwith raised continuous central support sheets for supporting said foodsand for receiving juices emitted therefrom during cooking, recesseddrain channels extending around the peripheries of the respectivesupport sheets for collecting juices drained from said respective sheetsduring cooking of said food, respective vertically projecting side wallsextending around the outer peripheries of the respective channels, andrespective juice outlet means formed by said respective trays at a lowerelevation than said support sheets and disposed out of verticalalignement with said respective support sheets; and support racks forsupporting said trays in vertically stacked relationship one above theother whereby said food may be supported on said respective supportsheets and upon heating thereof for cooking, juices from the food of therespective upper trays will be captured on the respective support sheetsand directed into the respective drain channels, from where they maydrain out said outlets with the juices from the upper trays clearingfoods supported on the support sheets of lower trays.
 8. Cookingapparatus as set forth in claim 7 wherein: said bodies are rectangularlyshaped in plan view and said side walls are formed in their lowerextemeities with respective outlets in the respective corners thereof.9. Cooking apparatus as set forth in claim 7 wherein: said side wallsare formed with recessed handles disposed at the opposite ends of saidbodies.